The invention relates to a device for installing in motor vehicles for recording distances traveled.
Many motor vehicles are used in circumstances where it is necessary to record the distance traveled. This occurs for many people at all times in that for income tax purposes they are required to distinguish between the personal and business use of the motor vehicle for a whole year in order to pro-rate those expenses which can be written off against tax versus those expenses which are for personal purposes and hence cannot be written off. At the present time this assessment is often made as a rough guess at the end of the year without any proper records since the keeping of the proper records is a time consuming process requiring great attention to detail. Obviously therefore the rough guess technique can be wildly inaccurate one way or the other with a consequent considerable error in the tax write off calculation.
In another circumstance where the occupant of the motor vehicle reclaims expenses from an employer or client it is desirable to keep accurate records of distances traveled.
In a yet further example, some vehicles are used by many different people for different purposes some of which can be authorized business use and some of which can be unauthorized private use of the vehicle concerned.
In recent years a trip-meter or odometer has become common in many vehicles so the occupant can set the distance traveled to zero before commencing any particular journey then note the distance traveled at the end of the journey. This is often an assistance to the recording of distances traveled but still requires the occupant to take notes of those distances particularly where many different trips are involved over a period.
The present systems are therefore open to error or abuse with generally the authorities involved being unable to check on the accuracy of submissions made by individuals or employees.